Turning Silence Into Insight: What Low Employee Survey Participation Really Means (December 2025 TogetHR Times)

For most organizations, employee surveys are the primary tool to take the temperature of their culture, workplace environment, and to assess engagement, morale, and the health of internal communication.  When an employee survey has low participation, it is important for leaders and organizations to take advantage of the outcome and dig deeper into what the result tells them.

Low survey participation isn’t just a data problem; it’s a trust problem.  Employees are signaling a disconnect between leaders and employees. This silence is a form of feedback, just not the kind that appears in charts. Research in organizational behavior consistently finds that when trust is low, employees disengage from optional organizational processes, especially those perceived as performative or inconsequential (Edmondson, 2019; Kahn, 1990).

Organizations and leaders can use this opportunity as a powerful diagnostic indicator and dig deeper.  Employees may be signaling that communication, leadership visibility, psychological safety, or past follow-through on feedback need reinforcement. How leaders respond can become a turning point.

Decoding Low Participation 

Low survey participation typically indicates one or more underlying dynamics:

1. Employees are unsure their feedback matters

2. Psychological safety may be low

3. Communication channels need clarity and consistency

4. Leadership visibility might be limited

If employees have seen surveys come and go each year without meaningful action, they reasonably assume future surveys will provoke similar inaction. This aligns with research showing that perceived impact is one of the strongest drivers of discretionary effort, like survey participation (Gallup, 2023).

Employees speak up when they believe it is safe to do so. Employees may be hesitant due to fear of retaliation, skepticism that anonymity will be protected, or uncertainty about leadership’s openness to feedback (Edmondson, 2019).

Are there clear, open lines of communication from the leaders to employees? If not, employees silence may reflect unmet communication needs of the employees themselves. If leaders are not frequently seen, heard from or engaged in daily organizational life, employees may view a survey as disconnected. Genuine visibility and presence significantly influence whether employees trust formal feedback mechanisms (Kotter, 2012).

Decoding Low Participation Results

Anything below 60% participation means the story your survey tells is incomplete, but the result is still meaningful.  Low participation consistently connects to one or more of the following factors:

1. Lack of Trust in Leadership or Process

2. Survey Fatigue Without Visible Change

3. Communication Gap

4. Timing and Accessibility Challenge

5. Cultural Apathy or Burnout

When employees don’t trust the confidentiality of surveys, or don’t believe the organization will act on results, they disengage from the process entirely. Even anonymous surveys can’t overcome a lack of psychological safety.  This challenge is one of credibility and one that managers and leaders should take to heart.

When employees see surveys administered frequently, or even consistently, but never see outcomes communicated or implemented, fatigue sets in.  Employees view surveys as a corporate void and don’t participate.

Employees yearn to know the ‘why’ and if they don’t understand or have heard from leaders why the survey matters or how it connects to business strategy or outcomes, it is seen as a low priority task competing with their real day-to-day work. When leadership clearly articulates the business reason for gathering feedback and connects it to organizational goals, participation increases dramatically.

If your organization has employees who may face logistical or technological barriers, prepare to make their participation as easy as possible.  Meet employees where they are and keep your pulse on the culture. Sometimes low participation is the symptom, not the cause.  Don’t lose high performers or risk more consequences by ignoring your low participation survey results.

Rebuilding Confidence and Connection : The Executive Response

Focus on the What not the How. Instead of asking ‘How do we get more people to respond?’, think of this as a challenge of ‘What must we change so people want to respond?’  Here are some strategic steps that executive teams and organizations can take to act on this type of survey data and participation effectively:

1. Acknowledge the Gap Transparently

2. Conduct Focus Groups or Targeted Listening Sessions

3. Close the Feedback Loop or Repair the Communication Gap

4. Equip Managers and Leads as Front-Line Communicators

5. Align Survey Timing and Design with Operations

While sustainable participation doesn’t come from reminder or incentives, it does breed from culture. High-performing organizations create environments where feedback is valued, visible and actionable. To dig deeper into any of the strategic steps mentioned, or discuss anything else survey-related, we are here to partner with you and your organization to maximize the potential of employee surveys and the results.

By Alison T. Bruns